One simple trick to a life in balance

Balance: everyone wants it, but no one has it. Here's a Way.

I appear, against all odds, to have found a state of balance.

Balance, for me, looks nothing like balance in popular culture. This balance isn’t “leg day, back day,” “a balanced diet,” or “work/life balance.” It’s subtler, more immediate, and—I believe—more liberating.

Here’s what it looks like: My posture is centered. Things don’t bother me like they used to. If there’s conflict, I know where to stand and what to say to cut through tension. If I feel hurt by someone, I respond with spontaneous lightness.

I believe this state of balance—my balancing act, you could call it—resembles that which is pointed to in terms like equanimity, equilibrium, the Middle Way, the Tao, and grace.

Because this state is so personal, it’s necessary to talk about my balance in this essay. I don’t know what balance is like for anyone else. But in describing my balancing act, I hope to guide you towards your own. I would love for you, too, to find your own state of balance.

---

The way

For millennia, balance has been a commonly occuring theme in myth, philosophy, and religion. Each speaks of a subtle, yet effortless way—a thin line—which, when walked, leads towards life, insight, and liberation. Here are some examples:

The Tao of Taoism and Zen

• The Great Tao is without difficulty if you simply have no preference. (“Faith in Mind”)

• The great Tao is easy, yet people prefer the side paths. Be aware when things are out of balance. (Tao Te Ching, trans. Stephen Mitchell)

The Middle Way of Buddhism

• Avoiding both of these extremes, the middle way … leads to calm, to direct knowledge, to self-awakening. (Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta)

• Whatever arises dependently is emptiness. ← is the Middle Way. (Nagarjuna’s Mūlamadhyamakakārikā, translation mine)

The “strait and narrow” of Christianity

• Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life. (Matthew 7:14)

Ariadne’s red thread, which leads Theseus out of the labyrinth in Greek mythology

The question becomes: If this way is supposedly easy, how do I find it? The quotes hint at an answer: Avoid extremes. Have no preference. Okay, but how?

One simple trick

What steers us off the way is resistance: wanting things to be other than they are. Resistance comes in two different flavors: craving (I like it → I want it → give it to me) and aversion (I don’t like it → I don’t want it → get it away from me). Moment by moment, when craving and aversion arise, let them go. That’s the simple trick.

Of course, this is easier said than done. I think the “simple trick” is hard for two reasons:

1. Craving and aversion are hard to recognize in each moment. We need to know what balance is before we know what throws us off balance. Thankfully, we can get better at this. (See “The still point” below.)

2. Craving and aversion work. (Temporarily.) Getting what we want, and getting rid of what we don’t, can bring a moment’s pleasure. The problem is: that pleasure is unstable. What if we don’t get it? What if we don’t get rid of it? What if it goes away?

As we become more familiar with the way, we cultivate faith. We directly experience the joy that comes from balance, and we see how that joy vastly outweighs the fleeting pleasure that comes from pushing and pulling.

Now: what does following the way actually look like?

Effortless action

Let’s start by describing what following the way is not. It’s not a vegetative state, in which you don’t act and you don’t care what happens. You do act, and you do care. And while following the way is supposedly easy, this is not the ease of assembling a simple puzzle or playing the first level of Space Invaders.

The way is easy in the same sense that walking a straight line is easy. You can do it without effort if you’re not under the influence.¹

So we could say that to follow the way is to engage in effortless action. This effortless action is like the serene concentration of a tightrope walker or the electrifying presence of a concert pianist. To act effortlessly is to act spontaneously and from a place of calm, yet to be vitally alive in every moment.

I believe this is what is pointed to in the Taoist concept of wu wei (“effortless action”), and its manifestation is what Buddhists call tathāgatagarbha (“Buddha-nature”) and Christians call pneuma (“spirit”). If the terms bother you, let them go. What matters is not what this thing is called, but what it looks like—and whether it helps.

To recap: I’ve described what the way is (a thin line), how to follow it (the simple trick), and what it looks like (effortless action). But I’ve really only explained how to follow the way in theory. Now, let’s follow the way in practice.

---

The still point

If we want the way to emerge in action, we have to find our state of balance in inaction. When we are still, the line collapses into a point. I’m not being figurative—I’m talking about a literal point. Take a look.

The posture of zazen is itself an expression of the still point (marked in red above).

The person above is doing Zen meditation, which is called zazen, and the red dot indicates her center of mass, which Zen calls the hara. I choose to call it the still point.

The idea is that if we can practice being still and balanced—if we find our still point—then we can develop heightened sensitivity to what throws us out of balance. Then we can better find and follow the thin, subtle line that is the way.

The still point, and themes of stilling and centering, show up all over wisdom texts.

• At the still point of the turning world…Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is. (T.S. Eliot, Burnt Norton)

• Be still, and know that I am God. (Psalm 46:10)

• Hold fast to the center. (Tao Te Ching, trans. Gia-Fu Feng)

If you want to find your own still point, you can read the section on shikantaza (“just sitting”) in my essay The meditator's handbook 📓. You can also read John Daido Loori’s short book Finding the Still Point. Finding the still point takes time, but with patience, it is inevitable.

---

My balancing acts

To ground these teachings, I’d like to close with a few humorous examples of my balancing acts.

🫗

Recently I spilled some water. I felt embarrassed as I dabbed the water up. A woman reassured me by saying “It’s only water!”

There were two (apparent) ways to respond. If I craved further approval, I’d say “Yeah, and I only spilled a little!” If I felt aversive to her, or to myself, I would have said “I know, but I’m still such an idiot.”

Reader, I did neither of those things. When she said “It’s only water,” before I had time to think, I blurted out “That’s what you think!” 😉

The way is mysterious. It’s also pretty damn funny.

﹗

Another time, someone said something provocative in a group I was in. Awkward silence ensued. What were my options?

If I craved that person’s approval, I might have said “That’s interesting! Tell me why you think that.” If I felt aversive towards that person—and believe me, I did—I would have said “Shut up.” I also could have stayed silent, but no one would have benefitted from that. Instead, I let the aversion go, centered myself in my still point, and then I shocked myself.

I said “Hmm!”

Somehow, “Hmm!” was enough to thaw the ice and let conversation flow again. It acknowledged the comment, did not dismiss the speaker, but did not encourage further provocation. “Hmm!” meant exactly what was needed for everyone involved.

💃

My last balancing act consists not of words, but of actions. The way goes beyond words. It’s not just spoken; it’s embodied.

I used to be a self-conscious dancer. Given the choice, I’d rather stand in the corner and talk about philosophy than get on the dance floor and be vulnerable. Not anymore. I don’t just dance at parties—I dance whenever there’s music. Coffee shop muzak? Time to dance. Ice cream truck outside? Time to dance. Even words, color, and shapes touch me like music. If you see me at an art museum, I’ll likely be swaying to Monet’s water lilies. T.S. Eliot’s invitation to the dance is more than a metaphor.

---

Life in balance

The film Koyaanisqatsi (1983) is named after a Hopi term which means life out of balance. Take even a moment’s glance at our modern world and you’d probably agree with its claim.

Koyaanisqatsi opens with breathtakingly beautiful shots of the natural world. Here, the Tao flows effortlessly. Life is in balance.

Machines enter the picture. Black smoke fills the frame. Bombs fall. Houses collapse. Nature is drilled, extracted, and eradicated. The balance has very clearly been disrupted.

In Koyaanisqatsi (1983), even though the modern world is out of balance, we can see a subtle way through.

We move to the cities. People, small as ants, zoom to work en masse. Cars trace out arcs of light through nocturnal cityscapes. Even though the world turns quickly here, its beings are led forward by a subtle way.

I’m exhausted from trying to single-handedly transform our out-of-balance world. I desperately want my children’s world to be cleaner, its people to be kinder, and its resources more evenly distributed. Perhaps you do too.

The irony is this: I’ve never changed anything from a place of desperation. The only change I have ever made came from equanimity: a calm, steady determination to keep going, no matter the difficulty.

I have never changed the world. I have never changed America. I don’t know if I ever will.

But I know, beyond a doubt, that I have changed myself. I also know that my change—my ongoing balancing act—is changing the world around me in incalculable ways. I know that my balance is rippling out far, far beyond me, and that those who I have helped are helping others.

I hope this helps you. Let me respectfully invite you to find your still point. Walk the way. Live a life of balance.

It’s simpler than you think.

1. …of craving and aversion.